User Tools

Site Tools


culture:state_of_the_alliance_2010_05_18

State Of The Alliance 2010-05-18

Dank Nugs

I remember when, on the second day of Dreddit, we were wardecced by Fear the Vampires (throw some numbers in there for letters, I don't know). We were incredibly disorganized having become a 500 man corp in 2 days, and no one knew what to think about the wardec, we just knew it would be fun. A gigantic fleet of 8 BS and 2 Guardians were practically stealing our 50 man fleet's lunch money. That is until, someone had the idea to grab a ton of electronic warfare skillbooks and put one ECM module on each and every frigate (I still want to know who's idea that was). By no means did we slaughter their fleet, but we rendered them useless and got a guardian kill (and would have killed more had they not run for the hills). It was at that time that I fell in love with Dreddit.

Since that time we have come a long way. Back then, we were alone. Now we have a ton of friends (thanks, Montolio). Back then, we swarmed people in our odd assortment of frigates. Now we have organized gatecamps, fly battlecruisers and battleships, and have been in many times more fleet fights than some corporations who are 4 times our age have been in. It pleased me to no end the other day when, on mumble, I heard a day old player ask for advice flying his trusty rifter and consequently get into a lengthy discussion with a player who had just gotten into a rifter for the first time a mere three earlier. In short, we've come a long way, in the 3 months that we have existed. Luckily, the spirit of reddit has persevered, and we are not a bunch of pretentious douchebags who frown on noobs who don't know what the fuck. We still manage to treat each other as the genuinely interesting people that we are, regardless of eve experience. This differentiates us from the many, many other groups who play eve, and is the reason that I feel we are truly a special group of people in eve that I am truly honored and absolutely thrilled to be a part of.

With the recent launch of Test Alliance Please Ignore, we have begun to come into our own as an eve entity. I see great promise in this new friendship between ARSED and B0RT. We have a very similar culture to one another, which I think is essential to the success of the alliance. I can't wait to see our two corporations get to know one another to a greater degree in the future. There is currently a list of corporations who want in, and in my opinion our number one criteria for entry should be an obvious integration with our ideals for having fun and treating players as exactly what they are, interesting people playing a game. Someday the galaxy will grow to fear and love the alliance that was just a test, and every day brings us closer to that goal.

We started our days in placid, bumbling around in frigates trying to figure out how to best scramble stargates and stations. We then made our mark on syndicate and cloud ring alongside the goons. After the goons were sadly pushed out of cloud ring by Nazis and some group of people obsessed with shouting about chaos, we went on vacation in Deklein, where we have been until now. Now, we are faced with a multitude of new opportunities that will forever define our existence.

Test Alliance Please Ignore's first military campaign, Operation Zerg Rush, has started as of this Monday. When we initially planned Operation Zerg Rush, it was meant to be a fun exercise of our newfound abilities working in the offensive, for once. Shortly after firming these plans up, new shit had come to light. In short, it has become obvious that the next chapter of our journey should take place in Curse and the surrounding regions. This move should be a full move; I don't want us to be separate like we were when our whole corporation was split between 9-4, RF- and Osmeden. We will be joining our new alliance mates, ARSED, in harassing our enemies as much as possible in Scalding Pass, Insmother, and Wicked Creek while supporting our allies in the area.

The writing for this move has been on the walls for some time, and a number of you have actually come to me having noticed the likelihood that we would soon move to curse. We will leave our mark on many regions in this next chapter, and we will further develop our sense of alliance identity. Big things are happening in the near future. As far as I know, you can leave some of your money-making assets and a jump clone in DKUK, as that will be our vacation home for the isk-deprived during this campaign. TCF and goons have really tossed us a lot of bones, and we will show our appreciation for all of their help in the coming months and years as Test Alliance Please Ignore. There will be convoys in the coming days to get assets to curse, and I recommend that you take part in this.

This is the beginning of something big. I want to remind you guys that you are taking part in, and moreover, creating eve history. I can't wait to see where we are in 3 more months.

We will be officially moving to [http://evemaps.dotlan.net/system/H-ADOC H-ADOC IV - Moon 12 - Archangels Logistic Support]. Stay tuned for more information.

Technical

Matalok

The technical team has been busy working to improve Dreddit and Test Alliance services over the last few weeks, with the formation of the alliance its caused a couple of headaches and opened up some new doors. In the very near future we will be doing some major work on the alliance infrastructure, expanding to suit our needs and also to fix some niggling issues:

  • Merging dredd.it and pleaseignore.com into a single Jabber server instance
  • Migrating the forums from SMF v1.1.11 to v2.0
  • Allowing alliance (@pleaseignore.com) and corporate (@dredd.it) email addresses available at a small ISK cost.

Now that Auth is settling in and we're finally getting over the last few speed bumps its time to expand out into other application areas and produce the “fun stuff” we've been meaning to do since day one.

As you can imagine our team is always stretched a little thin, We are always looking for able developers, if you can produce reasonable code in PHP, Python, or even Ruby then you need to get in touch. The technical team can provide you with any resources you need to get running (git hosting, project management, test server) all you need to do is get in contact.

Also, as many of you know, we currently have a Paypal account to accept donations towards the hosting and operation of alliance services, and a Shattered Crystal affiliate account to pull back a percentage of ETC sales. More information on these can be found on the wiki. Sometime in the near future we are aiming to run a donations drive to buy in some much needed hardware, this will allow us to have a pure, alliance owned machine and also take some strain off the back of the current hosters. More information will be posted closer to the time.

I'd like to thank everyone involved with the technical side of Dreddit/Test Alliance, in our very short time we've setup a effective and well regarded system, Without the initial support of a few people (n7s, Rixule, alex) we wouldn't be where we are today.

Propaganda

Misaki Tanaka

These past few weeks have been a boon in the area of propaganda for both Dreddit and Test Alliance Please Ignore. With many factors going into it, such as the recent video, branding the new alliance now that it's been named, sovereignty taking in Delve psyop, and the external forum posting that went with both; we've been doing a great job breaking the morale of the other side and boosting the morale of ours.

The video that was recently released was one of the best I've seen an EVE player/corp/alliance do and it set the bar high for others. The bulk of the work mainly by Tez, but worked on by others including myself, was and is a big hit. I would say the only thing not handled the best was the original posting to COAD, which even though could have been better, could have been much worse.

The branding of Test Alliance Please Ignore is going well Ljec Viso is making some very good headway on making a few alliance logos. A big note that we will not be able to have an in game logo for at least 6-9 months. This is a hard rule by CCP, and petitions will fall on deaf ears. So don't ask.

As many of you know there is an ongoing psyop in Delve. This originally was a lol-op by a few and led by Twizted. They dropped a territorial claim unit (TCU) in basically rifters and a blockade runner expecting to be killed immediately. However, the original party underestimated how many of IT Alliance's forces were in the north, and it went online. Soon after we determined that it would be better to drop more TCUs, so we did lol quote. As far as I am aware we dropped 4 total in this order ZA9-PY, M5-CGW, 1-SMEB, and E3OI-U. Of those 4, ZA9 was killed after onlining, 1-S was killed before going online, and M5 and E3 are still online. As the point of diminishing returns has come, we have abandoned further ops there for now and if IT doesn't drop the TCUs, we will not pay the bill and sov will drop naturally.

Which brings me to my next point, external forums. They are the only area that I feel need a lot of work by us. First of all know that I will never gag the forums unless it's for a good purpose, but it's always a good idea to check these forums before posting anywhere else to make sure there isn't a gag order in effect. Gag orders can stretch from all external forums to just one or even one thread. Now as a general rule I do not like the idea nor, under my watch, will I ever censor anybody. It's not how reddit rolls, it's not how dreddit will roll. However, know that these external forums are about a rough and tumble as you can get, and on top of all that it's extremely public. If you want to post but aren't sure if it's a good post pass it by a few people on jabber first.

We also need to stay away from responding to people that disagree with us in external forums. We don't want to look like easy bait for trolls out there, which unfortunately so far, we do. It's a good idea to stay away from the quote function, entirely. This keeps TEST members out of very public, annoying, and thread shitting grudge matches. This has been happening a lot lately and needs to stop. Keep in mind that external EVE forums are not reddit and long response chains are not really appreciated.

Word of Bort is floundering a little. Word of Bort needs an editor, and I'll use this opportunity now to ask for a member to step forward to head up this portion of the Ministry.

I'm not sure how Dreddit Radio is doing as I'm not able to really listen during prime time. If you are having any non technical issues with it PM me please. Matalok and I are working on getting the radio to stream MP3, AAC, and OGG but several factors are complicating things. Aevum, Tez, and myself made a PHP landing page to show the currently playing as well as listeners. As a self advertisement The Ministry's Deep Space Transmission Episode 5 is out.

The future of the Ministry is that Tez and I are working on a new video or two, so make sure to use fraps for anything EVEN IF YOU THINK IT'S BORING. Ljec will continue to do branding work as well as theme wok for our own forum theme (we may be switching to SMF 2 soon). And I will continue dropping trollbait in forums.

PS - DREDDITMAN … we need the lyrics. I am giving out 200mil of my own money for a good Elton John version

tl;dr - There is no tl;dr .. just read it.

Logistics

Twizted Sizter

With one massive move down and another one around the corner, we've been keeping busy here in Logistics. I'd like to first thank everyone who helped with the move out of Empire space for committing the time and energy that it took to get Dreddit into Deklein. Thanks to the capital ship pilots Montolio, Digital Charon, Jinli Mei and John Slogan and to all of the folks who helped move jump fuel and light cynos along the way. I'd also like to thank Crazy Rage in particular for all of the help he provided in getting gangs organized to move fuel around and for handling the distribution of ships and cargo in DKUK.

I've posted recruiting threads to get an idea of our logistics capabilities and to recruit pilots to do moon surveys. I had planned to survey Venal, but with our move out to Curse and the surrounding area that's currently on hold. I'll announce the new survey plans once they've fully formed.

With the move out of DKUK into H-ADOC, Logistics will be providing some support to help pilots move their personal ships and gear. We will be placing limits on the number and types of ships and cargo containers moved through capital jump fleets, and we will also work with the military division to provide escorted convoys for people who haven't moved out yet. Look for announcements regarding those moves this week.

Finally, I'd like to make the official announcement that I've appointed Crazy Rage to be my lieutenant. He's been an invaluable aide in all of the work that we've done and I'm happy to have his assistance moving forward. I'm sure we'll be very busy in the coming weeks as our TESTies spread throughout the southeast.

Diplomacy

Montolio

Several new corporations have lined up to join Test Alliance Please Ignore. You will be seeing new forum boards pop up under Allied forums as they move forward in this process. Please feel free to ask questions of them and give your opinions to alliance council members & your corporation directors.

North

We've set the NC blue and sent out messages to all the NC alliances to set our alliance blue. Progress has been made but we will need to verify standings sometime in the future.

Southeast

ATLAS & Co (Gentlemen's Club, Cult of War) are heading back home from the campaign against the NC. We should be getting some good fights from them in the next few months.

Armada Assail are some new buddies that will be hanging out in Curse & Great Wildlands to help out.

We have begun an effort to set up NAPs with the NRDS coalitions living in Great Wildlands. These alliances & corporations are hostile to ATLAS & Co. We'd rather work with them against a common enemy then shoot each other and not achieve any strategic objectives.

The following organizations have been set NAP at the alliance level:

  • Waypoint Holdings (Corporation)
  • Republic Alliance (Alliance)
  • Bene Gesserit ChapterHouse (Corporation)
  • True Reign (Alliance)
  • Rescue Team (Corporation)
  • Solipse. (Alliance)
  • Rising Phoenix Alliance (Alliance)
  • Right to Rule (Corporation)
  • Beer and Smoke Federation (Alliance)
  • Redneck Rage (Alliance)
  • Crimson Dragons (Alliance)
  • Noobswarm (Alliance)
  • Electus Matari (Alliance)

Training

Aevum Decessus & Silwar Naiilo

The official (TEST) Mentor Program has begun, with over 15 little TESTies assigned so far to our 22-strong mentor team since it began on March 6. Presided over by Silwar Naiilo, the goal is to target two groups: noobs already in the corp, and entirely new people who are first starting EVE, such as those who find us through Reddit. They will be assigned to mentors who will teach their students about the basics of EVE, get them into a tackling rifters, and teach them how exciting EVE can be in an alliance like TEST.

The program will increase our visibility and decrease the learning curve involved in playing EVE, and will help increase new member retention rates. Because the new members will be assigned to a personal mentor, they'll be able to ask questions and figure out a good training path to maximize efficiency. Mentors will also provide ships and skillbooks to new members, which reduces the otherwise requisite “dead-time” grinding low-level missions and mining.

Currently, plans are in development for standardized guides, skill book / mod packages, and skill training paths. Standardizing student training will allow mentors to receive uniform information put in place by area experts, while allowing for mentors to be on stand-by to help answer questions and guide the student towards an appropriate path.

A jabber channel for Mentors and Mentees (TESTers and TESTies) to gather for general Q&A/organization has been created. Anyone can join [email protected] to participate.

Our current mentors and their mentees: Silwar Naiilo (head of program)

Aevum Decessus (Director Contact/Support)

Djehngo

Tez Saurus (training: dametenshi)

Reverted Pacifist (Igno1)

rob3r (Vurseus, SmilingJoe Fission)

Selma Body (leetcheese)

Senor Libertad (Pon Kon)

Aphalionex (FunkyFr3sh)

Dqqmbot2

Kewagi Guiscard

Gerard Gendri

Nynjato (Tigerboyce1, An Danni)

Vash Nomet (Bandoll)

michael boltonIII

Modoros (Gling)

Invitus

Wu Jiaqiu (Sub Atomic)

Jorn Lancaeron (Flaran Da'an)

Xystance

Crazy Rage

Alue Deets

culture/state_of_the_alliance_2010_05_18.txt · Last modified: 2016/06/26 19:59 by conscript